Before the Last Supper and Jesus' arrest, he offers – in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke – teaching about forthcoming tribulations and warns people not to be taken in by false prophets.
But what do his words really mean for Christians today?
Luke tells the story in chapter 21. Jesus' disciples admire the great Temple, and he tells them that "the time will come when not one stone will be left on another" (verse 6). He says many will come and pretend to be the Messiah, he warns of famines and pestilencs and persecutions. "You will be betrayed even by parents, brothers, relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death. All men will hate you because of me" (16-17). He also warns of a terrible time for Jerusalem: "They will fall by the sword and will be taken as prisoners to all the nations" (24).
These prophecies have two levels of meaning. One of them is about the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD by the Romans, when the Temple was destroyed and the Jewish rebellion brutally crushed. But if that were all it were about, this chapter would be of no use to us.
However, it also takes a long view of history. It looks not only at events 40 years into the future ("I tell you the truth, this generation shall not pass away until all these things have happened", Jesus says in verse 32) but at things that are happening all the time.
Jesus paints a picture that could be of almost any time in history. At the moment in Iraq and Syria Christians are being brought before rulers, just as Jesus said, and condemned to death. Families have been broken up and whole regions have been devastated. "How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers!" says Jesus. "There will be great distress in the land and wrath against its people."
Does this mean the Second Coming is iminent? No, Jesus says. That will be unmistakable (verse 27).
These passages are not easy to understand. But perhaps they mean something like: don't imagine that the bad things happening in the world, no matter how terrible they are, have any particular prophetic or spiritual message. Evil is just to be resisted or escaped, whatever it is and however it shows itself. It is not part of God's plan and has nothing to do with the return of Jesus. We shouldn't believe anyone who says it has; God's kingdom is in God's timing.
